The Projection Studio Designs Cairo Arab Media Festival Opener

UK-based, The Projection Studio, was commissioned by Cairo production company PromoSign to create a large-format projection show for the opening of the 16th Cairo Arab Media Awards, staged at Media City in Cairo.

The awards were aired live across 18 countries. The 13-minute piece was part of a visual spectacular, including fireworks, which was projected onto a full-size scenic replica of the old Cairo Stock Exchange building (also known as the Bourse), which is part of one of the current film sets being utilized at the studio.

Ross Ashton, of The Projection Studio, became involved in the project via Egyptian producer Ashraf Haridy, who was aware of The Projection Studio's previous work and recommended him to the show producers, who wanted to up the production values at this year's awards.

Once everything was confirmed, they had just two weeks to create and compile the artwork for the show, which celebrated the history of Egypt and the development of the Arab media -- covering print, radio, TV, digital media, and the Internet. There was also a section for each of the 18 countries involved in the Awards event.

PromoSign already had some definite ideas about elements of the projection show, which Ashton adapted to produce the specific effects they required; he also added his own input. PromoSign supplied about a third of the original material and the rest was created from scratch or taken from archives to their brief. Ashton and Paul Chatfield created the PIGI effects from this material.

The creative process included 3D mapping of the building so the projections and artwork could be fitted precisely to the architecture, allowing it to be used as a true 3D surface rather than just having flat projections applied. Effects included moving images within the windows, rotating columns, and mask-contra-mask effects.

Karen Monid edited a special soundtrack for the projected visuals, using material sourced from the De Wolfe music library in New York, and provided a custom two-minute intro and outro composed for the show.

Ashton also designed the projection system, which consisted of four 6K PIGI projectors with double rotating scrollers, two of which were used to fill the surface and the other two to achieve the cross fading and contra-masking. The throw distance was 197', and the images covered the entirety of the 105'-wide "building."

The show was programmed and run by Monid using an OnlyCue system. The projectionists were Simon Schofield and Phil Supple.

Ashton comments, "It was an interesting show and involved some real pressure due to the short lead-time and intense schedule for preparation, so I am really proud of what we managed to achieve."